Where wood meets magnificence: Chrysler’s Town and Country nameplate turns 75

Appropriately, and unlike pretty much every other car, one of the most celebrated nameplates in Chrysler’s history, the Town and Country, originated not with a sketch or a design brief, but with a name that eventually became a car. That nameplate has also proved one of Chrysler’s most versatile and longest lasting, with its 75th anniversary approaching next year.

While credit for the original Chrysler Town and Country goes to then-Chrysler president David Wallace, the name originated with the Boyertown Body Works, as Donald Narus related in his book Chrysler’s Wonderful Woodie – The Town and Country, 1941-1950. In 1939, Chrysler had hired Boyertown to build a series of prototype station wagon bodies for Dodge, one of which bore the Town and Country name, inspired by its “town” front and “country” back half. (For posterity’s sake, the other suggested names – Country Club Sport and Country Gentleman – fell by the wayside.)

Boyertown didn’t get the contract for the Dodge station wagon, but the Town and Country name rattled around in Wallace’s head for a while until he decided to build a Chrysler station wagon that would embody that “town and country” dichotomy. So he gathered a number of his engineers together in Chrysler’s Jefferson Avenue plant and worked with them to hammer together a wood-bodied station wagon prototype out of a 121.5-inch wheelbase Windsor chassis, Windsor front clip, a seven-passenger limousine roof, and a couple of cords’ worth of white ash and Honduras mahogany.

Archive photographs courtesy Chrysler.

After seven weekends of their own time Wallace and his group turned out a prototype that he then drove to Highland park to show to his bosses, who reportedly had no idea what Wallace was up to. “There was nothing about the lines of this newest Chrysler car to suggest a truck or something makeshift,” Narus wrote. “The finished product was a handsome wagon sedan that, indeed, did follow the line of the steel-bodied sedans.” The board of directors approved, and Wallace put the Chrysler Town and Country into production in March 1941 as a mid-model year addition. Pekin Wood Products of Helena, Arkansas, provided the wood parts, Briggs supplied the sheetmetal, and Chrysler assembled it all at the Jefferson Avenue Plant.

While the barrelback bodystyle with the half barn doors garnered plenty of attention when Chrysler first released the Town and Country – the brand’s first station wagon and the first station wagon at all to feature a steel roof – perhaps the most unique feature of the first Town and Country models was the available three-row seating, made possible by a rear seat that slid fore and aft to make room for a center seat that folded down from the back of the front seat. Total production for the 1941 and 1942 model years, which ceased with the intervention of World War II, amounted to 1,997 cars, two of them one-offs built on the 127.5-inch wheelbase chassis.

The Town and Country nameplate continued after the war, but not as a station wagon. Rather, Chrysler developed a number of other bodystyles: a four-door sedan, a two-door sedan, a two-door hardtop, a convertible, and a roadster. Aside from a limited run of seven two-door hardtops, only the four-door sedan and the convertible went into production. As Narus wrote, the postwar Town and Country became a status symbol almost overnight.

“The Hollywood set immediately took to the Town and Country convertible… everybody that was anybody had to have one,” he wrote. “The sedan, while it did not share the glamor of the convertible, was perfectly at home on any of the swank estates of Long Island. If you had a country place in Connecticut and were anybody at all, you surely had a Town and Country sedan to go along with it.”

That heyday lasted until 1948, when Chrysler returned the Town and Country nameplate to its station wagons, but retired the wooden bodies for all-steel versions decorated, at first, with ash trim and Di-Noc inserts. It continued as Chrysler’s top-level station wagon on the full-size chassis and what would become the C-body platform over the next few decades, then in 1978 switched to the mid-sized M-body’s LeBaron. Another switch came four years later, when Chrysler applied the Town and Country to its front-wheel-drive K-car, in the process bringing back the Town and Country convertible and the woodgrain trim.

For one year only, 1989, the Town and Country nameplate didn’t appear in the Chrysler lineup. It then returned in 1990 as Chrysler’s entry into the then-burgeoning minivan market, where the nameplate has remained ever since. Woodgrain went away fairly early in that run.

Over the years, the pre-1949 wood-bodied Town and Country station wagons, sedans, and convertibles have generated a good amount of praise and gathered a significant following, enough to warrant a chapter of the National Woodie Club and secure their designation as Full Classics by the Classic Car Club of America in 2010.

Chrysler appears to have no plans to commemorate the 75th anniversary of the Town and Country nameplate, though it has released a 2016 anniversary edition of the Town and Country minivan that marks 90 years of the Chrysler brand sans Maxwell.

Allen Gronskysays:

December 10, 2015 9:45 am

I have always loved those Chrysler Woodies. My personal favorite has always been the 1948-1949 Town & Country Convertibles. I once owned a 1978 Chrylser Town & Country Station Wagon in Classic Cream (light yellow) with the vinyl wood trim. Looked great from a distance but Vinyl is a poor substitute for Ash and Mahogany WOOD.

JohnnyGearboxsays:

December 10, 2015 10:16 am

Howiesays:

December 10, 2015 12:04 pm

Dicksays:

December 10, 2015 10:23 am

Nice article. To me those cars always looked like they should be driven about 45 miles per hour, maximum, as the joy of the journey and the statement of the arrivial in a machine like the T&C, had to exceed anything the destination had to offer. Can you imagine being a kid and having a three hour road trip to Grandma’s house in a ride like that?

Danny Plotkinsays:

December 10, 2015 10:38 am

I vowed to one day own an early T&C made of timber. But then I realized that apart from the beautiful wood, the car is rather dumpy, and with solid, reliable but sleep provoking performance. That’s when I decided my future T&C will be a 1968 model, with 440 TNT, rear A/C, luggage rack, and every option that could be had. I’m still looking.

J Franksays:

December 10, 2015 11:59 am

Another great observation on the car in question by you, sir. The TnC, while certainly good looking, was a status symbol and had nothing of note to offer in performance, driving ability, or comfort. Not that they are not desirable, but it is like a Fiat Jolly to my eyes. There is a form of almost unfathomable worship of certain things by folks with more means than sense, and ownership of these is on the edge of such worship. I cannot understand the overly inflated prices paid for a Fiat that was gutted and chopped, even if by the factory, to be sold in limited numbers to the idle rich as something for their yacht. It would seem that the same marketing was applied to these cars. Had they not been a status symbol, I would find it hard to believe that they would have been produced as long as they were, and they would not command the value they receive today. They were difficult to maintain, with more akin to marine maintenance of a wooden boat than with a car. Many simply rotted away due to lack of maintenance. However, with all that said, should someone even offer me a ride in one, I would happily jump at the chance.

Tony Natolisays:

December 10, 2015 11:05 am

My Dad purchased a ’46 in the same color right after he was discharged and a stay at the Naval Hospital in Long Island New York. There he met the Wave Nurse that eventually became my mother in ’48.

He purchase the car where he worked at Milford Auto Sales in Connecticut… and I was brought home in it from the town’s hospital to our 900 square foot home about 1 block from the beach. I doubt he was a member of any country club… but he musta sure looked like it!

autobug2says:

December 10, 2015 11:49 am

Tony, my dad had a red `47 T&C convertible too. Grandpa had some buddy that ran the local Chrysler dealer here at the time, and he was VERY lucky to get one of the only ones sold here in Omaha back then. I found out Dad had one when I was about 8 or 9, rummaging through shoeboxes of old family photos in the basement. Found a faded B&W snapshot of Dad, with his foot up on the front bumper, and noticed the wood sides. Asked Dad, “Was the car wrecked and repaired with wood or something?” and he laughed, explaining what a Town & Country was. Mom said people gawked at it everywhere they went; admiring the wood finish & ox blood maroon leather interior. The `46-`48 dashboards always reminded me of a Whirlitzer jukebox.

Randy Dsays:

December 10, 2015 11:17 am

From Russiasays:

December 10, 2015 12:08 pm

Paulsays:

December 10, 2015 12:24 pm

In two months time I will have owned my tan 1946 Town & Country Sedan 48 years .
Showing 100.000 miles now it works and rides like it did the day it was purchased by the first owner before I imported it from Mass ,USA. to Canada . Recently I placed it in my basement on blocks again for the winter after that many years of casual summer driving and shows.Someday I may take the crate off it to see what the body is like but presently I like it like it is ……..

December 10, 2015 12:36 pm

Jim Mcsays:

December 10, 2015 1:06 pm

Unfortunately when I think of the Town & Country, I think of the pos minivan. The old wood bodied sedans, wagons, and convertibles from the 40’s were very beautiful and elegant cars. Chrysler products have given me more trouble than any other make of car on the market. They are nice to look at, but only if they are someone else’s driveway.

Ed Coopersays:

December 10, 2015 1:29 pm

It was 1953 and I was 18. Qua Buick in Cleveland OH had two used cars that caught my eye; a metallic blue ’51 Mercury and a green T&C, both convertibles and both $1700. Guess what car any cool 18-year old would buy.

raysays:

December 10, 2015 11:44 pm

………great memories, Ed, you’re a bit older than me, so I can’t guess which one you picked, but by about 1954, used Fords and Mercs had the young guy market all to themselves…….flatheads ruled, the odd Rocket Olds or customized Chevy snuck in, but Chrycos of any sort were never a factor………as much as T+C’s appeal to me now, in the day they were the ultimate geezer cars!……(please note, Studebakers, Kaisers, etc. were even farther off the radar)……just the way it was…..

Paulsays:

December 10, 2015 3:02 pm

My answer to keeping the White ash & metal body on my T&C like new is and was NO -Sun,Water or salt for the past 48 years ( and it worked)…..
I have had Chryslers in my driveway for the past 65 years and on average they were fine.

Paulsays:

December 10, 2015 3:03 pm

Kensays:

December 10, 2015 6:08 pm

Are you sure about 1989 being the only year the T & C wasn’t marketed? I was recently thinking about what was the oldest model name still in use, and T & C came to mind, but when I checked my Chrysler reference books it appeared to me that the wagon was not called the T & C for a few years in the early 1960’s. Maybe ’62-’63? I personally love Chrysler, and had a 1973 T & C wagon that I loved. I hope someday to get a 1949 Windsor like my father had. We had that car for over 20 years.